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'A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. You are speaking, Hman, as if the pleasure were one thing and the memory another. It is all one thing. The seroni could say it better than I say it now. Not better than I could say it in a poem. What you call remembering is the last part of the pleasure, as the crah is the last part of a poem. When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it. But still we know very little about it. What it will be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then-that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it.' [2]

C. S. Lewis#182

TimeMeaningMemoryPleasureReflection

About this quote

What does it mean?
The real value of a moment comes from how it grows in memory.
In plain terms
Memories are part of the pleasure, not just the event.
What can you take from it?
What you remember about an event becomes its true meaning.

Where it applies

  • reflecting on the past
  • valuing life
  • grief

Putting it to work

  • revisit good memories
  • value the reflection

Questions to consider

  • How does memory change your feelings?
  • Is a moment only real when remembered?

Another view

It risks living more in the past than the present.

More from C. S. Lewis

  1. Die before you Die. There is no chance after.

    Permalink to quote #181
  2. If there is equality, it is in His love, not in us.

    Permalink to quote #183
  3. ''Are the gods not just?' 'Oh no, child. What would become of us if they were?''

    Permalink to quote #180

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